Chch airport departure lounge expanded

Press, 8 December 1988, Page 6

Chch airport departure lounge expanded

By

LES BLOXHAM,

travel editor

New Zealand Customs took a pioneering step towards streamlining Tasman travel when the Prime Minister, Mr Lange, opened the enlarged international departure terminal at Christchurch Airport yesterday. Under a new pilot scheme, Customs officers in Christchurch and Melbourne will exchange information on passengers through a computer link. Other Australian cities served by flights from Christchurch will join the network in the next two or three months.

“If the trials prove successful we will extend the link in New Zealand to Wellington and Auckland next year,” said Mr Ron McGrath, Customs general manager (border opera-, tions), for New Zealand. That would then allow the pre-clearance of, initially, passengers with New Zealand and Australian passports while they were in flight across the Tasman, he said.

All they would need to do on landing would be to produce their passport for stamping. Customs officers would no longer need to spend time keying data about arriving passengers into their computers because that information would have already been transmitted into the system during processing on departure. “This of course will significantly reduce delays on arrival,” said Mr McGrath. The scheme will be extended to other countries when the data-exchange programme with Australia is operating. “We have already transmitted test data between Christchurch and the United States,” said Mr McGrath.

Computer terminals for four officers in specially designed booths have been provided to streamline the processing of passengers in Christchurch’s $10.2 million departure lounge. It is twice the size of

the old lounge and includes a bank, duty-free shop, souvenir shop, refreshment bar, toilets, nursery, telephones, and seats for 200 passengers. But two airbridges that were to have been installed in time for yesterday’s opening have been delayed until next year. The airport’s chief executive, Mr George Bellew, said the delay had been caused because negotiations were still continuing with several airlines over proposed increases in landing charges and other fees.

Agreement was near, he said, and this would clear the way for airbridges to be ordered, “lam hoping they will be in use in time for winter,” said Mr Bellew.

Congratulating the company on its development plan, Mr Lange was invited to mark the opening by cutting a bright blue ribbon.

“I’ll cut through anything blue with compunction,” he retorted, with a flourish of scissors.